Amid the Church abuse allegations, we set out to understand…

.@marianaa_alfaro and I hit all 5 boroughs and asked readers to chime in. W/ @mlouttit @traceytully & @jefurticella we honed in on 10 stories with distinct points of view that were emblematic of the city's diversity. @AFergusonPhoto magically brought them to live with his lens:

Daniel Dougherty, 58, walked away from the Church two years ago at the behest of his younger brother, Shaun Dougherty, who was sexually abused by a priest as a child.

“Shaun said, ‘You’re helping them fight me. You’re helping them raise money by collecting at church.'"

For a time, Raya Abat, 27, left the Catholic Church, but she has since come to peace with her identity as a Catholic.

"If anything, it makes it more urgent for me to stay, not to abandon this church and the people who are in it because we need to heal together."

Theresa Schliep, a senior at Fordham University, wrestles with whether to still identify as a Catholic.

"Saying that I’m not a Catholic is a huge statement. The fact that I was raised something, and I’m deciding whether or not I am still that thing.”

For Thomas McGarvey, being a follower of the Catholic Church is not only an act of devotion but, it is also an act of resistance.

Mr. McGarvey said he was 16 when he was first sexually assaulted by a priest.

“I hate saying his name,” said Mr. McGarvey, now 52.

Fernando Sánchez relied on his faith after he told his family he was gay when he was a senior in high school.

But he recently stopped going to church.

After coming out, Mr. Sánchez said he initially convinced himself that the church “didn’t hate me for being gay.”

Jacques David said he believes the cover-up of sexual abuse shows the church hierarchy has not adhered “authentically to what Jesus taught.”

“We are broken people, and so it doesn’t shock me that this has taken place. What shocks me more is sort of the response to it."

In the face of the sexual abuse scandals, Rosanna and Antonio Jimenez made a decision: to get even more involved.

"You can show everyone that this is not going to stop us,” Ms. Jimenez said. “And that, if anything, we're going to do even more.”

Kung Seung Lee, 31, began attending a Korean Mass at the St. Francis of Assisi Church in Midtown Manhattan, just a few blocks away from Koreatown.

There, he found a bustling community of newly arrived immigrants and other Koreans his age.

Rev. Agustino Torres, a Franciscan friar:

“This is a little dramatic, but the word that I felt is that the church is kind of on fire and I need to run into the building and I need to be a part of the solution.”